History of Earthquakes in Bangladesh

During the last 150 years, seven major earthquakes (with M>7.0) have affected the zone that is now within the geographical borders of Bangladesh. Out of these, three had epicenters within Bangladesh. The earthquakes and their effects are described in Table .

However, the recent awareness in Bangladesh of possible earthquake risks and necessary preparations has been due mainly to the devastating earthquakes that hit India in 2001, South-East Asia (particularly Indonesia, Sri Lanka and India) in 2004 and Pakistan in 2005. Reports by Bilham and co-workers have indicated that Bangladesh is under major seismic risk, with earthquakes of magnitude 8.0 or more already overdue in the Eurasian and Indian plates.